Dive into the world of living with a cognitive disability

How does it feel to enter a building as someone with an intellectual disability? Or as someone with autism spectrum disorder? In this immersion session, you will step into the shoes of someone with a cognitive impairment. Together with disability experts, you will explore solutions to remove barriers.

→ Experience firsthand the perspective of someone with a cognitive impairment.

→ Engage in dialogue about your experiences, with your peers and disability experts.

→ Take home concrete tips to make your services, workplace, or products more inclusive.

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foto: © Judith Desmyttere

Program

  1. Experiential exercises: step into the shoes of a person with a cognitive impairment. Each participant will experience, through tasks and activities, what it feels like to live with neurodiversity (specifically ASD, intellectual disability, and acquired brain injury).
  2. Reflection on experience: engage in dialogue with other participants and disability experts, initially in small groups and then with the entire group. From these reflections, we distill practical principles about accessibility in terms of support, communication, and environment. Disability experts contribute additional practical tips.
  3. Insights: we conclude the session with insights gained and an overview of general principles related to inclusion and accessibility. Armed with these insights and principles, you can immediately start taking concrete steps forward in your company or organization.

  1. Experiential exercise on cognitive impairment
    During an experiential exercise, participants are exposed to a number of characteristics of a cognitive impairment (more specifically ASD, mental disability, ABD). The focus is on a combination of overstimulation of the senses and difficulty with socially desirable behavior. This is done in a context where behaviors, sensory stimuli and words take on different meanings. In this way, participants experience what life is like for people with cognitive support needs.
  2. Persona mapping cognitive disability
    We discuss in groups what the participants thought of the exercise. Their experience is especially central. We also show the testimony of a number of individuals with cognitive support needs. This gives a good picture about their environment and what concerns them. We re-map all collected information based on person mapping. We also consider the general principles of cognitive support needs.
  3. Journey mapping
    Based on several cases, we will work in groups to create a customized journey map for a person with cognitive support needs. Each group will then share their journey map with the full group. Through collective feedback and discussion, additional insights will emerge.
  4. Evaluation and feedback
    We wrap up by having everyone articulate their main insights of the day.

Practical information

  • target audience
    companies and organizations that want to gain insight into living with a disability
  • duration
    half day
  • group
    from 5 to 20 participants
  • location
    this workshop preferably takes place in the company or organization

Dive into the world of living with a cognitive disability
The immersive course has motivated us to work even further on inclusion.
Alexander Alonso, General Manager BD Benelux

Any questions? Stien, Kurt and Marijn are happy to tell you more.

Stien Van Obbergen

account manager companies and organisations Meer info

Kurt Vanhauwaert

account manager companies and organisations Meer info

Marijn Leroy

account manager companies and organisations / team leader Meer info